


My skin doesn't fit (can I borrow yours)

by Whenhopediesyoung



Series: You know the dance (those damnable steps) [2]
Category: X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Scarification, Self-Hatred, Unrequited Love, child soilders, implied suicidal ideation, self destructive tendencies, why Raven joined the brotherhood of mutants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:01:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21586561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whenhopediesyoung/pseuds/Whenhopediesyoung
Summary: It's familiar, almost claustrophobically so, a grim smile, some hard eyes, her chosen name spoken disdainfully.(She'd follow him to the ends of the Earth)
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Raven | Mystique
Series: You know the dance (those damnable steps) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1555777
Kudos: 3





	My skin doesn't fit (can I borrow yours)

It's a nice enough face. Or rather, a handsome one, because there is little nice about the hard planes of the face. The mouth is distinct, but not inclined towards smiling, and the shoulders hold themselves at attention even when alone. That, at least, will be easy to remember (Raven's do that too).

The body is inclined toward rigged stances, long dark clothes made for warmth and warning. The height keeps anyone who might approach at bay. Raven's made the mistake of choosing people who look like they may not scream or fight before. It's amazing, how far hair color and height go toward warning someone off.

She likes her new hair color, lighter then she usually goes, when a woman, and thick to the touch. It had been what drew her eyes, blue and watery then, toward the swiftly moving man. He had moved like a hunter, or no, like the cross between a hunter and a involuntary soilder, newly released and eager for blood.

She had felt a strange kinship with the man. Hunt for hunt and scar for scar; despite having only taken him in at a glance. If she was someone else she might not at his retreating back, may wish him luck on his goal. But that someone was dead, only Raven remained (not even her).

Instead Raven took his face, shifting between one step and the next, getting a second glance that the watcher then rationed away. They were good at pushing logic away. The hunters came next. Skitty and fast with fearful desperation. They fought like plain soilders, fell like plain soilders, so unlike her own enemies (they never fell at all, you had to bury them alive).

Raven had considered leaving the face there, it had baggage and she had just escaped her own. A glance in a passing window, though, at the mirthless face and the worthless pursuers behind, changed her mind. The skin fit like it had been hers first, she wanted to keep it. So she would.

Raven was not in the practice of making things hard for herself. If she needed to kill she would, if she needed to leave she would. Sometimes it seemed to her as if all she did was kill and walk away. She had toyed, for a little while, with the thought of marking her kills, but her body was lined enough and it seemed pretentious.

Occasionally Raven would let her scars reappear, would enjoy the horrified looks on grandmother's faces while she walked through arms deeply scarred. She had, at some point taken _her_ advice, and done it almost artistically. Lines angled across her shoulders, then straight down to her elbows, winding above and below her elbows then down again thicker to her wrists.

The meticulousness made the more jagged (desperate) scars more jarring. Broke her out of her half-focus when she got stuck, eyes tracing the extensive marks. Made her feel, sometimes, like her body was just that. Hers, not a piece of art or mask half stripped away.

She had been thinking about that, with the wistfulness it deserved, when Raven realized she was wrong. The face- the _man_ was not a escaped soilder, was not the same as she. He was a captor (a commanding officer- and her shoulders felt like _fire_ ), he was in command.

_The first thing you learn, head thrown to the side from the force of the blow, blood pouring, is you never take their faces._

He stood in the room she had filled with traps and carefully arranged mirrors. His shoulders seemed to take up the room. Raven walks right up to him (might as well) fully planning to bolt past him and jump through the window first chance she got.

That's the plan, only as she gets closer she becomes aware of a dragging sensation, slight and then greater, as if something is pulling her back. As if the metal on her person has grown weight and self awareness. She wants to laugh, even knowing it'll come out as a half crazed cry.

_The second thing you learn is harder to believe. No matter how many times it happened. You never believed them not until they dragged you, beaten and bloodied back to the house. Until you hit the ground hard enough that a fracture turned into a break. Until you laughted and laughed and laughed as blood ran down your throat._

Raven just stopped. Let's her mouth curve into a wry smile. _They take it all from you, early enough you never find out what that actually was. It wasn't a kind face and maybe that should h_ ave been her first clue. I burned it all down. _The house the soilders inside it (faces soft and young like under clay)_. Or maybe her clue should have been how much she liked it. _She could still smell flesh bubbling like water in the heat_.

"Who are you?" His voice is low, and not quite as hard as his face. Raven closes her eyes, savors the accent on her tongue. She had known something was missing from her portrayal, she always did. _'How did you know he had a limp, you never saw him walk?'_ Finding it now settled something in her.

She wouldn't go back.

Raven circles him, knocking off some height, adding muscle to her dark clad legs. "Raven." She answers smoothly, watching him watch her. He's fascinated, plainly, and she can see that familiar possessiveness in his deep set eyes. Lines carve themselves on either side of his nose like he's trying not to make a contemptuous face.

Familiar. Almost claustrophobically so, as his mouth lifts into a grim smile with his hard eyes holder her dead ones. 'Y _ou should be dead'_. "Raven." He says it slowly, savoring it. She can hear the under current of distain beneath. Familiar.

"How would you like to meet some like minded people?" He raises a hand, the metal in the room flies to him, swirls lazily over his hand. She can smell fire, _'I loved you, I mourned you, we all did'_. She killed to get away from this, friends ' _please_ ', lovers ' _take her and run_ ', children too well trained to say anything at all.

She looks at him, cruel eyed and almost possessing his own gravity. Looks to the metal moving under his control. Thinks about dogs and soilders and tears running down silent children's faces. Waits for a spike of guilt that never comes. Waits to feel anything at all.

Her skin feels dead and ill fitting. This will kill her, she knows it the same way she knew about his accent, the way she knew his shoulders never sunk even when relaxed. He won't feel anything for her when she does. A soft, almost terrible feeling winds its way through her. Tender. She smiles at him, hiking her lips up like ill fitting jeans.

And answers.


End file.
